According to newly released figures for August consumer prices from Eurostat, the 12 month average inflation rate in EU was 3.5 per cent. For Switzerland and Norway the growth was distinctly lower, both with 2.3 per cent increase. On the other hand, Iceland had a much larger increase in prices, with a 7.4 per cent average rate the last 12 months.

If we look at the Eurostat indices, where the prices in 2005 are set to 100, we see that for Switzerland and Norway the prices are respectively 4.6 and 7.0 per cent higher in August 2008 than in 2005. The figures from Iceland show a much stronger increase in prices. There the price level today is almost 25 per cent higher than the level in 2005.

For the EU countries the prices in August 2008 were about 9 per cent higher than the prices in 2005.

As shown in the graph below, the growth rate in consumer prices started to increase in the second half of 2007, for both EFTA and EU countries. While Norwegian and Swiss consumer prices followed the pattern from the EU prices, the growth in Iceland consumer prices took a dramatic change early in 2008. So far this year, the consumer prices for Iceland have increased by almost 13 per cent. In the same period, the Norwegian and EU prices rose by about 2.5 per cent, and prices in Switzerland increased by as little as 1.6 per cent.